Reality Redesigned: The GAUNTLET Ep3: DF-350

The GAUNTLET:Episode 3 of The GAUNTLET: A behind the scenes look at the Judges critiquing and analyzing the top 9 designs in the Reality Redesigned contest.

To win the GRAND prize, each of the top 9 Reality Redesigned contestants come face to face with our 7 Judges in The GAUNTLET video series. Way to go Daniel! Your DF-350 design qualified for the top 9 in the Reality Redesigned contest. Time to see what the Judges have to say about it....

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DF-350: Designed from the ground up, the DF-350’s suspension system is what sets it apart from the rest. Using a new 6-bar linkage design, the DF-350 is able to incorporate an extremely low center of gravity and top of the line braking and pedaling performance into a suspension system that provides a 75% rearward wheel path. This is all made possible by the connecting rod between the chainstays and the seatstays which force the wheel dropouts on the back of the bike to remain almost perfectly level throughout all 208mm of wheel travel. This helps prevent rough terrain from having any negative impact on wheel traction while hard on the brakes.

90 Comments

Sorry, but this was by far the most thought out frame design, it has a decent model and the designer posted videos explaining how everything worked.How can someone have issues with external cable routing? its got to be over 95% of bike made today still have external cable routing.Also mike montgomery's comments were dumb why even bother to include them in the video, of course its going to be similar to other downhill race bikes they are all designed to do the same thing.

If they picked this many holes in this design I cant wait to see how they react to the 'design' that won.

It makes no sense that they would bring up the bearings. Wouldn't that be worked out during the prototyping process? It seems like they knitpick stuff as though it was a finished product, not a design waiting to get some venture capital so they could get it off the ground. From the positives I heard someone should be calling him about buying his design right now. Also, if the top tube didn't look like an intense tube and the seat stay didn't look so devinci-like then the pro rider wouldn't even have thought it was a mix of other designs.

The problem with this is that they need to pick faults to be highlighted on the video amongst the other pros to give a balanced argument. But most of these faults are ones that only really come out during testing, so they can only make assumptions...
And to top it all off, Mike's comments are just a bit simple and he's obviously just been drafted in for the 'cool factor'.
Christy

Agreed, agreed, agreed. All great points. Bearings & external cable routing are unnecessary things to bring up at this stage... are they forgetting it's a CONTEST? The goal is to decide through analysis and feedback, who has the best design, whether it be for practical overall application, or a specific target, like this downhill frame.

And seriously, Mike's comments could not be more retarded. He is unneeded as a judge here..."I would definitely probably ride it""people will buy it cause people will buy anything""pretty cool even though it's a mix of different designs"Whatever Mike.

the only complex design that makes sense but plagued by manufacturing tolerance issues (it can be made easily but it would cost a shitload of $$$). imagine if rockshox factory made this, they would turn out worse that the evil revolt/undead disaster

It would have been awesome if some one (a manufacturer) would step up and just build a test frame of this design! Then let them (the judges that can ride) critique the design first, after that give the frame a go and see what they have to say? Love the design myself, thats about all the judging I need to do.

the slight bend on the down tube of the M9 outlines a cradled monocoque section that supports the rear half of the main frame and shortens the length of the front triangle, creating a very stiff and strong construction. People truly will buy anything however, proven by the masses continuing to buy Sundays and Revolts after massive amounts of failures due to over stressed areas or production errors.

I'm not talking about the 'slight bend in the top tube' you fool. I'm talking about frames that are welded on the piss, out of whack, don't line up! And a shocking record of cracking and snapping. I'm one of the people riding a Sunday. I've had it for 6 years and it's still straight as an arrow and going strong... Play in the rear triangle bearing points? Yup. Welded on the piss and cracked? Nope... And of course people will buy anything. It's an empty and pointless statement supposed to sound profound... Like people will eat anything. Sure they'll buy anything but if it turns out to be a piece of shit, badly made and breaks?? Word gets out and they don't buy it no mo...

this show is failing me every time i see these stupid updates. only guy who knows anything is the Intense guys. the rest of the people sound like they haven't really ridden a bike. Mike's comments are useless.

sounds like you guys already chose a winner from the start and now you are formulating reasoning behind why all the other projects will not work. sounds bias due to the fact of the true cost that your show would have to invest in order to produce 1:1 scale prototype frame would be unattainable.

It takes going over and over a design to perfect it. There are always going to be changes and innovations that can be made. Daniel, the designer of the DF-350 did a really awesome job on his frame. Fantastic actually.. that's why he made it to the top 9. But we all know it's a great design. We could talk all day about it.. but why not take the opportunity to show what needs improvement so that he can improve it to make it the best it can be? The Intense guys are super smart, definitely. As are the other Judges. Each of the Judges are looking at different aspects of the design. For instance, Marie from SolidWorks zones in on the CAD designs, JoAnn focuses on how the design solves a problem and the innovation behind it... etc. Hope that clears things up a bit.

The Intense guys talked more crap than anything. "Don't know about idler designs? What sort of idiot that designs bikes wouldn't look at all design possibilities. Dismissing an idler due to inefficiencies LOL, a correctly placed idler could offer better pedaling characteristics than an M9 has.. and machining the bottom bit out of a solid chunk, off on a tangent, who said it had to be a solid chunk, way to create a negative.Sorry, I'm a bit heated after watching that vid. What an injustice.

Agree fully with NSM. This "contest" is just dumb. Mike is an amazing rider, but doesn't know sh*t about bikes beyond riding them. That goes for many pros, especially pros in the "freestyle" element where improvement doesn't include gathering and analyzing data. Jeff's comments were just sad, I expected a lot more from an engineer. "this needs more development and probably a few iterations"...no sh*t, it's also the only entry in the contest which required actual thought and innovation.

For this to hold any legitimacy, the judges would need to be innovative designers/engineers, a pro who may actually ride the bike for its intended use, and some frame builder who does small scale manufacturing to provide input on cost reduction/manufacturability.

Sure, it's not ready, but C-C mentioned he didn't have enough time to finish it. However, the kinematics are there. I'd love to ride this back to back with my Jedi. It's nice to see some real thought put into suspension designs.

People with vested interests in promoting their own designs should not be on the panel of judges. Can't wait to see what Intense have to say about the gearbox bike. " More talk of inefficiency with out mentioning that it's more efficient as you can get in the right gear any time anywhere on a track and every time in a split second. Not to mention the benefits to suspension having way less unsprung weight, but that will be ignored or dismissed also. Same with reliability.

I reafinishlly think they chose bad judges and It was a silly mistake making them all american. Wtf is with the woman 'internal routing would be nice' Its a design not a finished product the pro rider isn't even a Dh rider and the intense guy seems quite silly with his comments 'I don't know much about high pivots' what would have been good is if the got a big manufacture on board to asess its manufacture ability kie shimano.:-)

I think what they meant about the bearings is exactly how the pivots are constructed- it would be good to show cross sections of all the bearing pivots. Detail design can really make or break a bike in terms of mass production.

There is no detail or serious design work in the bearings or pivots yet. It was actually stating in my submission that I simply ran out of time to do everything. Was more concerned about getting the suspension dynamics just right for the contest than sizing bearings and pivots. Hopefully that was the way to go for the judges.

You definitely made the right call then in explaining how everything works and getting the overall design refined- it's very well thought out in that regard.

The only real area of concern I would have is the bearing pivot design, especially in the seatstay area as that link is really the key to the concept working. If it isn't able to be manufactured properly then the suspension will bind- that's why I say showing a pivot cross section through that joint (preferably dimensioned with manufacturing tolerances) would show the judges the degree to which the design was thought out.

I do hope you continue to develop your design and work out all the construction details (no matter the outcome of the contest) as it appears there is a significant amount of interest in it.

Thanks for the reply, I know what you are talking about in reaching manufacturable tolerances. At the connecting rode it should not be a big issue once the design is refined. The real tolerance issue is actually going to be between the BB and the lowest pivot right next to it. It may require moving the pivot, which would mean completely refining the suspension again, but I will do what it takes.
Cheers!

I like the fact that it looks like the designer has thought of things beyond Intense cycles limited resource being a small company. For intense to pick fault in price of materials with their drop outs is laughable.
It is often the case that people outside of the box can think of things more readily than those inside the box.

I think he's thinking of the GT RTS. The Sunn Radical Plus was somewhat similar as well in that they were both high pivots with rocker links. Both of those bikes are functionally very different to your design.

my comments got deleted fuck this shit its just the same shit as i told before nothing new, even symbiosis back in the days and thats like 17 years ago , had the same idea, changing one location of a pivot does not change the fact its a copy of an old idea, think harder about new stuff i aint gonna praise this product or glorfied copycat thats why i quit the business

Single pivot + floating brake would not accomplish the same thing, and why would you bother with the hundred other single pivot bikes around. This is a contest about innovation,

@U, since a prototype has never been built, you have no idea of the final price nor how the tolerances would affect it. I love my DW trailbike, but you can't say it's better having never even sat on this bike.

I understand what you are saying baca262, and in terms of pure dynamics you are almost right. But by having the back end float I can put the idler pulley lower allowing it to avoid the main pivot. Also the added braces will increase the sriffness. Finally in my personal experience floating brakes are not always the most reliable, but that could likely be changed.

i see what you were aiming for. maybe you could omit that linkage in the back by mounting the caliper on the chainstay (wilson) but idk how the chainstay moves exactly. if that's possible (wouldn't cause brake jack like some of the lawwill designs), you could have a single pivot on the seatstay and avoid the fsr/split pivot patent trolling, also it would be much easier to make.

I see what you are saying, and I tried well over 50 rough variations of 4 bar ideas to get this. It can almost be done, but the center of gravity will not be nearly as low. If I do it the Wilson way, it does not compensate enough for the high pivot and short chain stays, not to mention this contest wanted something new . Another thing about this 6 bar design is that I can modify it to give me almost any leverage ratio I like without it having a negative effect on the braking forces (not an adjustment but a different geometry of the linkage).

As the model maker for this contest I really wanted to do just that, especially for this design. Unfortunately this was a bit of a side project outside of my regular work at 3D Systems I just didn't get the time

to make this as simple as possible, no. 75% of the time the axle is moving in it's travel it is moving vertical with a slight rearward path. It does not mean the axle moves backwards the way you cock a pistol.

It's not at all the same. Devinci uses a split pivot 4 bar design with a pivot concentric to the rear axel. My design is a 6 bar that keeps the wheel mount level throughout its travel. Take a look at my video description posted in a link in the article.

Take a look at a Norco Aurum and a Trek session 88. They look alike. Yet are two very different bikes, with different suspension platforms. As a matter of fact, the differences between this design and that of the devinci is significantly greater than that of the Aurum vs the Session 88. If you take more than a quick glance you will see that the DF-350 is very different and something new to the bike industry all together.

The Divinci is just a rip off too.Save your breath Crazy C, you're trying to get a blind person to see something.Great design, you must be bummed seeing what idiots the judges are. What a load of crap. Intense aren't going to rave about high pivots because they don't sell them, and Palmers bike is totally irrelevant to the M9 let alone the DF-350. Who the hell are all the other clowns, only the guy with the model had anything logical to say. Who was the woman? What does she know, and why was only the bottom button undone on her young assistants top dang it.Cable guides, how trivial.As for "definitely probably" ha ha, then quoted as "probably definitely" ha ha ha, what the ....Hope this bike sees the light of day. Interesting design.Good luck with it in such a fickle messed up industry of lies and mistruths. A bunch of school kids probably could've come up with better comments.

@NSM - Too true, too true. Steber's comments were a joke. You could almost see fear in his eyes, like he was looking at an awesome frame that wasn't his, and didn't want to acknowlege it. And for Montgomery, well, what do you expect? The guy's obviously not a pro rider because of his intellect, grammar and vocabulary. Probably definitely? Hahahaha. And to say the frame isn't original? Really? And he's an expect on the history of mountain bike suspension frame development? While a high pivot and idler may not be original, they're usually used in single-pivot designs. Only thing comparable is the Canfield Jedi, but, it doesn't incorporate a floating dropout, so ya, this is essentially a completely original bike, in that it incorporates various elements that haven't previously been incorporated into a single suspension design, as well as bringing in unique elements, like the floating dropout, which to my knowledge, is pretty original.

Way to go tinfoil on us. Imho the frame still needs work. It's a nice design but there are a few non SP idler bikes (ghost for example) and I also wonder about rear end weight. Will it nullify the benefits or a really rearward path because of a ton of unsprung weight.

It's a nice idea but it's not reason to bash other people for not liking it 100%.

You are all aware that this idea is nothing new, nice drawing , nothing less . but absolutly nothing new, check your mountain bike history , i dont admire old concept that get redrawn, but kuddos on the cad

the 1997 balfa nouveau riche and gt rts serie , same exact fucking idea, the mountain bike industry will no longer evole they have run out of idea , period , , so that why i quit any interess because all the young one shut there mind to the idea of the past , all they see if cute aluminium shit ass bike that are nothing new, so yes look it up same idea, nothing new

Doctorz, I believe you may be mistaken. Both the bikes you mentioned are high single pivots, the DF-350 has a floating wheel mount to eliminate brake forces. The closest thing the linkage on this bike resembles is a lawwill linkage, difference is this design allows for a lower center of gravity, more room for modifying leverage ratios, and the potential to have a stiffer rear triangle.